


i can tell just what you want (you don’t want to be alone).

by katarama



Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: Alcohol, Alive Niall Lynch, Dissociation, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Homophobia, Infidelity, Kissing, M/M, Physical Abuse, Trauma, Underage Drinking
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-24
Updated: 2020-08-24
Packaged: 2021-03-06 14:34:32
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,066
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26090470
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/katarama/pseuds/katarama
Summary: Adam keeps himself small because a small life is easy to move, and there’s only a year and a half between him and college.  He keeps himself small so the wanting doesn’t grow inside him like a weed, spreading so fast he can’t keep it contained.Adam could want everything, if he let himself.
Relationships: Declan Lynch/Adam Parrish, background Ashley/Declan Lynch
Comments: 16
Kudos: 76





	i can tell just what you want (you don’t want to be alone).

**Author's Note:**

  * For [stonerskittles](https://archiveofourown.org/users/stonerskittles/gifts).



> For the prompt: [In a dark, dark wood there was a dark, dark house and in that dark, dark house I think we should get drunk and fool around. (I want dirt under my fingernails.)](https://asofterworld.com/index.php?id=857)\+ Adam/Declan, from [my a softer world prompt meme](https://sleepy-skittles.tumblr.com/post/155287327552/50-a-softer-world-prompts).
> 
> This was intended to be a birthday present for the wonderful Sadie. It still is, but it is now very, very belated, and posted on Theo’s birthday, instead. Whoops? Either way, thank you to Theo and Lee for listening to me butt my head against this fic for two months, and to Theo for the beta.

Adam keeps his life small.

Every morning, he wakes up to his alarm. He sneaks past his father, asleep in the armchair and smelling of stale beer. He bikes to work, works his shift, bikes to school. He sits by himself in class and sits by himself in the cafeteria, sometimes sits by himself in the library instead, where no food is allowed. He keeps himself awake, keeps his hand in the air, keeps his head down. He bikes to work. He works and then he bikes home and then he answers his father’s sharp questions, _yes, sir_ , _no, sir_ , _sorry, sir_. He feels the passive gaze of his mother burning into his back as he leaves the kitchen to hide in his room, studying until his eyes grow heavy.

There is a certain kind of rhythm to it. He has been doing this for a year and a half now. Some of it for longer. He understands the boundaries of it. His whole body aches, bone deep exhaustion a fact of daily life, but it does not matter. He is used to this. Used to long-sleeved shirts in Henrietta summers, used to deceptively soft reminders that he brought this on himself. That if he were only better, this would all stop. He’s used to never fully feeling awake, never fully feeling alive, never fully feeling present. Used to the sharp pain of his ribs, every breath a reminder, _you are nothing_ and _you are alone_.

He overhears conversations at school about boat trips and parties and all the other things he is excluded from. He makes excuses to himself about why this is okay. Outsiders are more trouble than they’re worth. Outsiders want explanations. He won’t give any. 

Adam keeps himself small because a small life is easy to move, and there’s only a year and a half between him and college. He keeps himself small so the wanting doesn’t grow inside him like a weed, spreading so fast he can’t keep it contained. Adam is a creature of wanting. He knows this, knows the tang of iron from biting his tongue before he asks for something he can’t have, knows the hot and curling tendrils of jealousy when he sees Richard Campbell Gansey III with his Colgate smile and pristine uniform and wild, curly-haired guard dog sitting beside him as he holds court in the cafeteria.

Adam could want everything, if he let himself.

He has learned to keep the wanting in check. He is used to living half his life in a fog, interrupted only by brief, sharp cuts of emotion. He has learned to keep his less useful feelings, desire and hope, in a box taped tightly shut until they are safe to bring out. 

In the meantime, he waits. He waits and he works and he gets by one day at a time, one foot in front of the other, because he can only go forward.

He can never go back.

_____

At school, Adam watches raven boys.

He watches the simple exchanges, a first bump before class or a huddle in the hallway to discuss cufflinks more expensive than Adam’s tuition. The rowing captain swaggers over to Joseph Kavinsky’s table at lunch, money and a plastic baggie changing hands out in the open. Henry Cheng stands by the door of the cafeteria to collect signatures for something stupid and pointless. Dick Gansey, handsome Aglionby golden boy, creates his own orbit wherever he is. Adam understands the urge to be close to him. Adam’s eyes still find him in every room he’s in. Dick Gansey takes up space like no one ever dreamed of telling him he couldn’t.

It isn’t a feeling Adam knows. It leaves an unpleasant taste in his mouth.

The other person that never fails to draw Adam’s attention is Declan Lynch.

He isn’t in Adam’s grade. He isn’t in any of Adam’s classes. He sits near Adam in the cafeteria, close enough for Adam to overhear snippets of conversation. He is a senior and he drives a flashy, expensive Volvo that his brother rides in the passenger seat of, when his brother isn’t in the passenger seat of Dick Gansey’s Camaro or behind the wheel of a BMW. When there isn’t a pretty blonde from Aglionby’s sister school filling the Volvo’s front seat, or pressed into the backseat, bracketed in by Declan’s body. When one of Declan’s friends isn’t sprawled on the hood of the car, careless and easy, talking about condoms and whiskey and afterparties.

Adam doesn’t think he’s ever seen Declan alone, because Declan doesn’t have to be. Declan is not alone when he sits in the cafeteria. Declan is not alone when he walks to class. Declan suggests a trip to Nino’s after debate team practice, and people say yes. Declan convinced people to join the debate team. Declan is always busy, always moving, always surrounded by people drawn to him like a moth to light.

Adam suspects that none of them actually know Declan, and Adam thinks Declan likes it that way.

In every conversation Adam hears, Declan talks a lot and says very little. If Adam weren’t listening closely, he might not notice. Declan tells a good story, his voice warm and captivating, the lies coming easy. It’s calculating and familiar, the way choices are made about what to emphasize and what to leave out.

Declan disappears for three days and comes back with bruises highlighting his cheekbones. His friends hear a story about the cows at the Barns stampeding. A month later, it happens again. Declan’s friends hear a story about a boxing mishap with Declan’s little brother. ‘No, not Ronan, the other brother. Yes, Matthew, did I ever tell you about the time-’

Declan’s friends hear four minutes about how Declan volunteered to work with his brother on his left hook. Adam hears four minutes of bullshit.

He considers going up to Declan when the table clears. Asking him where the bruises really came from. Looking him in the eye to see his face when he explains, instead of catching pieces of conversations. But Adam doesn’t, because Declan is never alone, because Adam doesn’t know Declan, either. 

It isn’t Adam’s problem, anyway.

Adam has his own bruises to worry about.

_____

The first time Adam sees Declan alone, it’s a bad day.

It’s a Saturday. Adam started the morning pre-dawn, sweeping up the pieces of a glass his father shattered the night before, shards that cut the soles of Adam’s feet when he stumbled backwards as his father’s arm swang. Adam felt himself shut down, only processing the pain of the hit and his mother’s voice muttering that he was making a mess, that he should know by now to just take it like a man.

Adam picked out the glass with shaking hands and did his best to cover the cuts with generic brand Neosporin and band-aids, but after a long shift at the trailer factory and an excruciating bike ride to Boyd’s, he isn’t sure if he’s imagining reopened cuts bleeding into his socks with every step or not. 

If he didn’t have to spend $45 on a paperback book for English class that wasn’t on the reading list, he may have been able to call out sick from Boyd’s. The factory does not care about bruises on his face. Boyd notices more.

But Adam needs the money, so he is working until close. He can barely stand, the pain so sharp it drowns everything out, but he can kneel, and he can lay on his back, so he finishes up work on an old clunker that has been giving him trouble for two days. He has an oil change on a Toyota and an hour to kill before his shift ends. 

A familiar, fancy Volvo pulls up, and he starts calculating overtime in his head.

Adam busies himself with clearing up his tools. He hears Boyd chatting about the weather, about the car. Boyd asks how Niall is doing, if he’s staying out of trouble. Boyd whistles over something, both of them staring at the car as Declan explains in a warm but exasperated voice that it was his brother’s fault. ‘No, not Matthew, Ronan, did you hear he-’

“Adam, are you good to start on fixing a dent tonight?” Boyd asks. It isn’t really a question. They both know the answer is yes.

“Yes, sir,” Adam says, his knees creaking as he forces himself to his feet. He nearly asks how bad they’re talking, but he doesn’t want to be rude in front of the customer, even (especially) if the customer is Declan Lynch. 

It turns out he doesn’t need to ask, anyway. There’s a giant dent in the side of the Volvo with a K keyed into it.

In case that wasn’t subtle enough.

“And a paint job, too,” Declan adds mildly, surveying the damage.

“No problem,” Adam says in his best customer service voice, his Henrietta accent bleeding in. He will hate himself for that later. “It’ll take a few days, though. You have a ride home?”

“Ronan’s on his way with the BMW,” Declan says dismissively, his attention turning from the car to Boyd. Adam shoves down the familiar burn of shame and anger that Declan has not so much as glanced his way. He knows by now what raven boys are like. “Is there paperwork I should fill out?”

Adam lets Boyd take care of things from there. He grimaces and settles in to assess the damage to the car. He knows it’s going to take at least two days, if things are slow. He hopes that none of Kavinsky’s lackeys drop by to see him working on it. They give him enough trouble as it is—he doesn’t want them noticing him any more than they already do.

A BMW pulls up to the garage five minutes later. Adam does not look, even when the car honks no less than sixteen times. He can practically picture Ronan Lynch behind the wheel, expression impatient, eyes piercingly blue. Ten minutes later, Declan walks straight out of Boyd’s office and past Adam to the parking lot, his phone pressed to his ear and his voice too low for Adam to overhear.

Someday, Adam will stop being disappointed by raven boys. Someday, Adam will stop hoping that raven boys notice him for something other than his secondhand clothes hiding skin and bones. Someday, Adam’s heart will not beat in his throat when he looks at a Declan Lynch or a Dick Gansey and thinks he sees them looking back, only for the day to go on like any other.

Someday, Adam will finally give in to the nothingness instead of being stuck in this no man’s land of feeling just enough for it to hurt. Someday, Adam will sit on the stairs of the double-wide, surrounded by darkness from every direction, without feeling the sting of loneliness and rejection and hopelessness. Without wondering why he even bothers, if any of this is really worth it. Someday, Adam will tell himself he doesn’t care and mean it.

Today isn’t that day. Today he has a head full of pain and a job to focus him, though. Today, that job is fixing up raven boy messes.

He pushes Declan out of his mind and gets to work. He can’t afford to be home late again.

_____

Sunday comes and goes. Niall Lynch calls to ask about the progress on the car and chats with Boyd for a half an hour. Adam knows this because Boyd comes out after to ask about the progress on the car. Adam's face hurts when he politely smiles and reassures Boyd that he’s working as fast as he can, sir.

Boyd claps a hand on his shoulder. Adam thinks it’s the gentlest touch he’s received in years.

Monday comes and goes. Adam debates not going to school. He goes to school anyway, because he missed time last month, because he has no one to give him notes, because he has a precalculus test. Gym class is torture. He spends his lunch in the library. He does not watch raven boys interact with each other. He does not see Declan Lynch. He does see Ronan Lynch, in Latin class. Ronan stares at him like he has never seen Adam before and isn’t sure he wants to now.

Adam keeps his eyes on the teacher. Ronan never says a word.

After another shift at the garage, the Volvo has to sit overnight, but is otherwise done. Boyd calls Declan to let him know he can pick it up after school. Adam rushes home to write an English paper and reopens half the cuts on his feet. He should feel something watching blood-stained water roll down the drain when he showers. He does not.

He does not remember a lot of Monday night. He is used to that, too.

On Tuesday, it starts pouring while he is at work in the factory. He covers his books with layers of plastic grocery bags before his bike to school so they aren’t destroyed when the rain soaks through the hole in his backpack. He waits until he gets to school to change into his uniform, but he doesn’t have a change of shoes, so his feet sit in their own puddle through first period. 

The rain hasn’t let up by the time the bell rings for the day and it’s time to bike to Boyd’s.

He expects the Volvo to be gone when he shows up to work, but it isn’t. The Volvo is still sitting there, looking good as new, waiting for Declan. He expected that the Lynches would be in a big rush to come pick it up, considering how impatient they were for the work to be done.

The BMW pulls up ten minutes before close.

Adam is, for all intents and purposes, done for the night. He finished his work and is stalling until he can clock out. He leads Declan over to the car to let him take a look and make sure it’s up to his standards.

Declan Lynch looks at the Volvo and then straight at Adam.

There are moments when Adam forgets. Moments when Adam thinks his outside reflects his insides, when he is focused and loses track of the physical reality of himself. Forgets that he is too thin, that not everyone has learned to block out gnawing hunger. Forgets he has dark circles under his tired eyes, because he hasn’t had a good night’s sleep in years. Forgets that a bruise that he adjusted to three days ago is still on his face, still looks ugly, still gets him a notice from the guidance counselor’s office that they scheduled an appointment next week to ask if everything’s okay.

The way Declan’s pleased smile slips quickly into something darker when Declan sees Adam’s face is a sharp reminder.

“I’ll go get Boyd so you can get this home,” Adam says shortly. 

Before Declan has the chance to get a word in edgewise, Adam pops his head into Boyd’s office. Boyd tells him to let Declan in. Adam sends Declan over and makes his best attempt at washing the oil stains from his cracked hands. He gets his things together and steels himself to head back out into the rain and wind and dark. At least he doesn’t have to bike past Ronan. The BMW is gone.

“Please wait a moment,” Declan calls after him. 

Under any other circumstances, Adam would be ecstatic. His heart would be racing in his chest and he would not feel his stomach churning, because Declan would not be looking at his face with an intensity that sets off alarm bells in Adam’s head.

Adam is tempted to blow him off, to jump on his bike and ride off. He doesn’t. He sits in a chair outside Boyd’s office while Declan finishes up and retrieves his spare set of keys. 

“The bicycle outside,” Declan says when he emerges, “is yours, right? I only saw Boyd’s car.”

“It is,” Adam says, his shoulders curling inward. He’s ready to be defensive about his rusty old bike, ready to ask why it matters to Declan, anyway. 

“It’s storming,” Declan says. “Let me give you a ride.”

“I’m not on the way for you,” Adam says. He doesn’t know where Declan lives, but he doesn’t need to. Wherever Declan lives, Adam’s trailer park is out of the way. “Thanks, though. You have a nice night.”

“Let me give you a ride,” Declan reiterates, firmer this time. “Your bike doesn’t have lights. It’s dangerous in this weather. It’s the least I could do, after you fixed the car.”

“I did my job. You paid my boss for the car,” Adam says bluntly. 

“Just put your bicycle in the trunk, Adam.”

It’s his name from Declan’s mouth, more than anything, that gets him. He knows that the smartest thing to do would be to say no, to bike home and not owe anyone anything, but he can’t help but be curious. He can’t help but want to know what Declan thinks he gets out of this. 

Plus, it would be nice to stay out of the rain.

He knows better to get caught up in wanting, but he gives himself a break, just this once.

“Fine,” he says, begrudgingly. Declan pops the trunk and unfolds a tarp to keep the bike from smearing mud and rain water all over the interior. Adam doesn’t ask why Declan has a tarp in the back of his car. Declan folds the back seat down and adjusts the tarp and fits the bike in like it’s easy.

“You’ll have to tell me where you live,” Declan says as Adam sits in the front seat. Declan pulls up google maps on his phone, and Adam shakes his head.

“I’ll just tell you where to go.”

Declan pauses for a second, gives Adam another one of those intense, searching looks, but sets his phone down. He turns the car on and pulls out of the parking lot, and Adam gives him directions. The car is silent except for the occasional ‘turn left up here’, the quiet drag of the windshield wipers and the hum of the car’s heating.

They turn off the main road, and Declan finally speaks.

“Ronan said you’re Aglionby. At the top of his year. He’s never mentioned you before, but suddenly he’s now the expert. How have I never seen you before?”

Adam isn’t positive if it’s intended to sting, or if that’s just a side effect. He feels the shame rising to his face, and he’s suddenly aware of himself once again. His grease-stained clothes, his worn shoes and backpack full of plastic bag-covered books that rustles every time his leg nudges it. His sad, shitty bike. His Henrietta accent that still slips through when he gets frustrated, or tired, or overly polite.

“I transferred sophomore year,” Adam says. He scrambles for something better to say. Something sharper. Something more proportionate to Declan’s suspicious tone. “And you aren’t that observant, anyway. You don’t come to people, they come to you. I haven’t. I have other things to do.”

“Those other things involve working on cars and getting into altercations?” 

“I don’t ask you about your bruises,” Adam says sharply. He knows he will regret this later, giving up so much. Declan didn’t notice Adam before, but he knows Declan will now. Declan will see him at the table next to him at lunch, watching.

Adam is going to need to spend lunch in the library for a couple weeks.

“I wasn’t really asking.” Declan looks at Adam as if he’s seeing him for the first time. Like he isn’t what Declan expected. “Are you?”

“No. It’s not my face, and you’d just lie, anyway. I don’t care. I’m not sure why you care, either.”

“I’ll cut to the case,” Declan says. “You aren’t friends with Kavinsky?” Adam can’t hold back his snort.

“You really don’t know anything, do you?” Adam sees the cluster of mailboxes at the end of the long driveway into the trailer park. “You can pull over here and let me out.”

Declan looks like he is going to protest for a moment, like he thinks maybe Adam is trying to run from this conversation. Adam is, but it’s also his mailbox, and under no circumstances is Declan going to drive down Adam’s road with his shiny Volvo and fancy watch.

“I don’t know what you are, Adam Parrish,” Declan says as he slows to a stop. “I don’t like not knowing.”

It clicks, suddenly, what this was. This wasn’t Declan giving a ride and asking for anything in return. This wasn’t Declan feeling charitable towards the poor kid. This was Declan thinking Adam was in league with Kavinsky. This was Declan trying to be protective of his brother, in the weirdest way possible.

Adam opens the car door as Declan pops the trunk. “That makes two of us, then, I guess. Kavinsky thinks I’m Henrietta dirt. But if you’re so worried, tell your brother to quit screwing with Kavinsky. He’ll get bored eventually.”

“That advice is less helpful than you think,” Declan comments. To some extent, Adam knows that. Everyone knows that Kavinsky’s up Ronan’s ass, but that Ronan’s up Dick Gansey’s. Or that Dick Gansey’s up Ronan’s. It isn’t Adam’s concern. Declan does look more settled, though, less cagey. Less like Adam is a bomb about to go off. “I hope you figure out what you are. I’m sure I’ll be seeing you around.”

“Thanks for the ride,” Adam says, his politeness returning. He pulls his bike out of the back and stands it upright. Declan doesn’t waste any time hanging around once Adam has the trunk closed again. Adam watches him speed off before he slowly walks his bike down the driveway.

His dad doesn’t expect him home yet, and if he’s too early, there will be questions. He’d rather wait in the rain.

_____

After the car ride with Declan, Adam expects that things will change. He goes into school Wednesday bracing himself to deal with those intense eyes of Declan’s seeing him there for the first time, noticing him where he was totally invisible before.

For the first few days, he is disappointed.

It’s mostly his own fault, he thinks. Entirely his own fault. He keeps running the conversation with Declan on a loop in his head, clinging to everything he can remember. The way the streetlights on the main road cast shadows on Declan’s face, making it look more angular, making Declan look older. The soft leather of the seats. Declan’s grip on the steering wheel. The way Declan’s voice turned on a dime from sharp to effortlessly charming.

The way Declan looked at Adam like he was a mystery worth solving.

It wasn’t a feeling Adam knew to prepare himself for. It wasn’t a feeling he could catch and squash before it started living in his chest, running circles in his sleep-deprived, delirious head that night.

He hides in the library for the rest of the week. He isn’t sure if it counts as self-sabotage or self-preservation. He secretly hopes that Declan will find him, anyway, but he doesn’t see Declan at all, not even in the hallways between classes.

He thinks the coast is probably clear once Monday rolls around, but he decides not to risk it. The first half of his lunch is spent reassuring the guidance counselor, again, that he gets bruises at his job (singular) and that everything is just fine at home. He plans to spend the other half of lunch alone with his Latin workbook at his table in the library, under the watchful eye of the librarian.

The first sign that this lunch period will be out of the ordinary is the absence of the librarian at her usual perch behind the circulation desk. Adam doesn’t think much of it. Every once in a while, she has meetings with the other teachers, or she goes out to lunch.

The second sign is the presence of two unattended backpacks on the table in the corner of the library.

In hindsight, Adam will think that was weirder. But Adam is tired. Adam doesn’t have the capacity to care about small anomalies. Adam sits down at his usual table and pulls out his work. Keeping things small means knowing when to mind his own business and get on with it.

Things go from unusual to completely off-script when five minutes into staring down declensions, a quiet but conspicuous cough comes from in front of him. 

Adam looks up out of habit, figuring it will be someone asking for help finding a book, or asking for the librarian. Not even Kavinsky’s lackeys bother him in the library, usually.

He does not expect to see Dick Gansey hovering awkwardly in front of his table, his hands stuffed into his pants pockets and his face apologetic.

“I’m sorry to bother,” Dick says, his old Virginia accent washing over the words. It’s the kind of accent that is moneyed enough to get away with being unapologetically Southern. Adam envies and hates it. “Have you seen Declan? Declan Lynch. He was out of town last week, and Ronan left something in the car. He needs to borrow the keys. Ronan said he might be here.”

Adam doesn’t ask any of the stream of questions that pop into his head. How he hadn’t heard that Declan was out of town, if that meant he didn’t need to hide in the library all those days in a row. Why Dick would think Adam didn’t know who Declan Lynch was. Why Ronan wasn’t here looking for Declan himself, why he sent Gansey to do it instead. Why Ronan would possibly think that Declan would be in the library, where Adam has never once seen Declan Lynch for more than 20 minutes at a time during the school day. How Dick’s brown hair could be impossibly tousled when he spent all morning sitting in a classroom, how his eyes could be even more impossibly bright up close.

“Haven’t seen him,” Adam replies. “If I do, I’ll let him know you were looking.”

“Thank you,” Dick says warmly. It doesn’t seem to occur to him that Adam wouldn’t know who he was. He turns around and walks back out of the library, and the moment is over.

It is embarrassing how long it takes Adam to collect himself, to shove himself back down to the proper size. He reminds himself that Dick Gansey clearly had no idea who he was. That Dick Gansey did not go seeking him out. That he was just the person who was there when Dick Gansey mistakenly thought a library was a place where anyone would find Declan Lynch. He stops running over fragments of sentences in his head and recenters himself, brings himself back to his Latin work.

He maintains his focus for another ten minutes before it’s disrupted by a clear, low moan coming from the stacks behind him.

Adam’s brain doesn’t have the time to process it before it’s accompanied by other noises, the crack of bone meeting the wood of the shelves, a loud _fuck_ that’s muffled mid-way through, that has images spinning through Adam’s head of a hand pressed to the mouth of an anonymous stranger.

He wants to know who it is almost as much as he never, ever wants to know.

The noises die down after that. Adam keeps himself glued to his seat, keeps his gaze fixed on his book. His eyes skim the pages, and not a single word sticks in his head. He does not let himself crane his neck trying to catch a glimpse. He does not get up from his chair to tell them to knock it off, that he is trying to study here, that if they wanted to hook up at school, they should have picked somewhere other than the library.

The five minute warning bell rings. Adam gathers his books. Adam does not look behind him.

“Whelk will love you for that,” a voice says, from closer behind him than before. It’s a deep voice, unfamiliar. 

“Whelk doesn’t love anyone,” comes the reply.

Adam knows that voice. Adam’s resolve crumbles, and he turns.

Declan walks to the table in the corner and slings his backpack over his shoulder. His lips are puffy and his eyes are warm and his hair is ruffled and Adam has never once seen him look less put together, less carefully crafted to look generically handsome. Adam vaguely recognizes the other boy, knows he is another senior. He doesn’t know his name or his class rank. He does know that the boy’s polo shirt is unbuttoned, that his neck is covered in red marks that Adam is certain will settle into bruises, barely visible under his school uniform collar.

Declan looks at the boy like he’s something to eat, and it puts a fire in Adam’s belly that he doesn’t know how to douse.

Adam stands up and pushes his chair under the library table, and either the noise or the movement is enough to finally catch the boys’ attention. The other boy has a deer in the headlights expression that Adam can’t help but find hysterical, considering the state of his neckline. 

Declan, on the other hand, reverts to restraint.

“Parrish,” Declan says smoothly. Adam doesn’t know how he does it, doesn’t know how someone with wild hair and hungry eyes a moment before can seem so perfectly composed. “We should catch up after class today, if you have a moment.”

“I have work,” Adam says. His head still hasn’t wrapped its way around this, hasn’t finished connecting the noises with a face. With Declan’s face.

“I’ll give you a ride.” The words are more of an order than a question, but Adam doesn’t have time to get his hackles up about it if he is going to get to class on time. Declan takes Adam’s silence for agreement. “Meet me by the car after the bell rings for the day.”

“I don’t have time for this,” Adam replies, even as he resigns himself to another vaguely threatening interrogation in Declan’s Volvo. “I have to go to class.”

Declan lets him go. Declan probably assumes Adam will show up at the car, bright and cheery and grateful for the ride. Declan clearly has no idea what he is dealing with, Adam decides.

When Adam sees Ronan in Latin, he remembers his conversation with Dick.

He wonders if Ronan ever found Declan and got what he needed from the car, or if two Lynches will be waiting by the Volvo after school.

_____

The bell rings at the end of the day, and Adam immediately heads to his locker so he can rush out to the bike rack. It’s tucked a little bit out of the way, which he has always assumed is because people with money don’t want to see rickety bikes like his. He hopes that if he beats everyone (Declan) outside, he can bike through the parking lot and be on his way before anyone can stop him.

He didn’t expect that Dick Gansey would throw a wrench in his plans.

“You’re Adam Parrish, right?” Dick asks, sidling up to Adam as Adam zeroes out his locker’s combination lock. “I apologize for not recognizing you earlier today, I’m afraid I had something else on my mind. Ronan told me you know how to fix cars, and my Camaro is making a rather unfortunate noise, so I-”

“Bring it up to the garage,” Adam says. He pushes away the voice in the back of his head that is suddenly afraid he is going to become the go-to Aglionby mechanic. “Boyd’s, that is. Ronan knows where it is. My tools are there, I can take a look at it.”

“Oh, no, I’m afraid you misunderstand me,” Dick says. “I don’t want you to fix it. I was wondering if you could teach me to fix it myself. I can pay you for your time, of course, Ronan said you do this as a job.”

Adam has no idea how to deal with this day. With Dick Gansey approaching him not once, but twice. With knowing that Ronan is talking about him to Declan and to Gansey, when Ronan hasn’t spoken to him once. He fills and zips up his backpack to stall for time.

“Di-, uh. Richard,” Adam starts, unsure and unprepared for how he is going to finish the sentence. He never gets around to figuring it out. Dick Gansey is mid-way through correcting him, ‘Gansey, actually, please,’ when an arm wraps around Dick’s (Gansey’s) shoulder.

“Dick,” Declan says warmly, a smirk on his face. “You aren’t bugging Parrish now, too, are you? He doesn’t strike me as the kind of boy who likes to be collected.”

Adam can feel his face go red as Gansey looks up at Declan darkly. “Hello, Declan. Speaking of collecting people, Ronan told me that your latest girlfriend stopped by the Barns this past weekend, hoping to surprise you with something. His words, not mine, are that you should really do a better job of at least pretending to care about them.”

Declan’s hand squeezes Gansey’s shoulder, and Adam winces. He wonders if he could make a break for it now, while Declan and Gansey are doing this weird dick measuring contest. Whatever this is, he doesn’t want to be involved in it. Whatever this is, he wants it to be over so he can just get to work.

“I have to go to work, I’ll just let you two catch up,” he says. He doesn’t wait for a response. He turns around and beelines for the exit, not giving either of them the opportunity to stop him.

As he bikes to the garage, he thinks maybe things would be better off if no one knew his name, if he were back to being anonymous nobody scholarship student. It’s a last ditch effort, attempt number three to talk himself down from getting too excited, from believing this is more than Gansey thinking he’s convenient and Declan wanting to cover himself.

It’s a last ditch effort to stop replaying the sounds of moans paired with the way Declan looked in his head, to refocus away from the way Declan made Gansey look small.

_____

“I asked around about you.”

Adam nearly bangs his head into the open hood of the shiny, expensive pick-up truck he’s working on when the voice comes from behind him. Adam has no idea what time it is, his brain numbed to the passing of the hours as his hands work, but he can guess by the way that the garage has emptied out that it is getting late. Not late enough that he’s the last one here, but late enough that he thinks he knows where this is going to go.

“Hi Declan,” Adam says, not turning to look at him. “I’m working right now.”

“I know. For another twenty minutes. I thought I could give you a ride back, since you were in such a hurry after school. Which, with Dick chatting your ear off, I can’t blame you, but-”

“What do you want?” Adam asks, finally turning around to face Declan. “I’m not going to tell anyone what I saw, if that’s what you’re worried about. I’m not going to run around telling everyone at school. I don’t even talk to anyone else at school, so. You don’t have to worry about me. I can keep my mouth shut. If that’s all you want, you can skip the awkward thing where you try to bully me into your car like a serial killer.”

Declan stares at Adam calmly for a moment, as if recalculating. Adam is once again struck by how familiar it is, the way Declan seems to look at the world like he is constantly assessing the least risky option.

Adam knows that feeling. Adam knows a person doesn’t develop that habit from having an easy life.

“I asked around about you,” Declan repeats. His blue eyes look darker in the light of the garage, Adam thinks. Or maybe it’s just the way that his eyes are focused on him head-on that has Adam paying more attention. “It’s a funny thing, when you ask people about Adam Parrish, because no one knows much about him. They can tell you he’s a very good student, top of all his classes except Latin. That he transferred in sophomore year. They can tell you he’s quiet, mostly sticks to himself. Can tell you he’s dirt poor, one or two said they could tell you were local. Henrietta local. I kept waiting for people to mention the bruises, but I didn’t even get much of that.”

“So you followed me to my work to tell me people think I’m smart but poor, and no one notices I have bruises but you,” Adam says flatly. The words sting, a confirmation of his every worst nightmare of how Aglionby sees him. It hurts even worse here at the garage, his hands grease-stained from fixing someone else’s car. He can’t pretend to be anything else, here. “Thanks. Congratulations on your observation skills. Message received, you can go home now.”

“No,” Declan said, “That’s not. Can you listen for just a second, I-”

“I’ll get in the car with you,” Adam says, because he can’t bear any more of this here. “Just. Go wait in your car. I’ll come out when I’m done.”

Declan doesn’t push. He goes back to his car, and Adam can return to the pick-up truck, more thankful than ever that his hands can run on autopilot, even when his brain is racing a million miles per minute. The shame sinks in his stomach and sours, and he wishes more than ever before that there was an off switch for his brain that didn’t involve sharp pain and hours or days of fog.

His whole body is tense with dread when he heads out to the parking lot, but he doesn’t make a break for it. Declan pops his trunk. Adam lets him put the bike in. Adam opens the passenger side door and sits down, buckles his seatbelt.

He can’t bring himself to look Declan in the eyes.

“I told you before that I didn’t like not knowing what you are,” Declan starts. “I thought maybe if I asked, someone might know. Someone might be able to explain you to me, or to tell me something, anything, about this quietly competent guy who’s beating them in all of their classes. You didn’t seem like you wanted to give anything away to me, and I thought it might be because you were offended that I thought you were friends with Joseph Kavinsky. But it wasn’t, was it? You don’t give yourself away to anyone. You hide yourself so no one gets to see what you are.”

Declan stares at Adam, expectant, and Adam feels his stomach churn. There is something uncomfortable about having someone notice his approach to surviving Aglionby. His approach to surviving life. There is something disquieting about having someone describe keeping himself small as not giving himself away to anyone. As if there were anything worth giving.

He stops himself before he starts to sound too much like his mother.

“Can you start the car?” Adam asks. He does not want to sit in the parking lot, letting Declan pry him open before they even start driving towards his double-wide.

Declan turns the key and pulls out of the parking space. 

“You know that you do the same thing,” Adam says, because if Declan is going to call him out, is going to make it clear he knows just how small Adam is, how invisible Adam has made himself, Adam is going to press some buttons, too. “You do it a different way, but I’ve never seen someone lie so much it sounds like breathing. I hear things. It’s hard not to, because you’re... _big_. People notice you. People like you. But you come into school with your own bruises, and you take your weird weekends away in the middle of the school year, and you walk around like you’re always watching your back. And you say it’s cows and brothers.”

“It could be cows and brothers,” Declan interjects. “The Barns. Where I live, it’s literally barns, we have cows. And I have two brothers.”

“Okay. Is it actually cows and brothers?”

There is silence in response. Adam takes that as all the confirmation he needs.

“You don’t owe me an explanation,” Adam says. “I don’t need one. I said last time that I wasn’t asking about the bruises, and I meant it. It’s none of my business, and I stay out of things that aren’t my business. I’m just trying to keep my head down and get through a year and a half more of this, when I can get as far away from this place as I can. I don’t really get why you can’t do the same thing.”

Adam lets himself look over at Declan, whose face is calm even as his hands squeeze the steering wheel tight. Adam had forgotten that he hadn’t given Declan directions to plug into the GPS app in his phone, had forgotten to give Declan verbal instructions, but Declan makes the correct turns, like the way to Adam’s is burned into his brain. 

It doesn’t make a bit of sense to Adam.

“I’m never going to get away from here,” Declan finally says, his voice low and strained. “I applied to colleges next year in DC, but I’m always going to be tied to this place. My dad has a family business I always get sucked into helping out with. I will always be worrying over my shoulder about my brothers. There’s no future where I could be Senator Lynch. As it is, my dad is running out of patience with my political internships. I’m never going to explain the bruises, but I can explain that family is everything for a Lynch. Lynches don’t take well to outsiders.”

Declan pulls up to the driveway back into the trailer park and stops the car. Adam doesn’t know what to do with the confession. He didn’t ask for it, but he feels it sinking into his head, restructuring everything. The way Declan knows everyone and no one knows him. The way Ronan clings to Gansey like a lifeline, like a last ditch hope. 

The way Declan’s relationships never seem to be anything more than shallow. The way that this, unlike many of the things Declan says, feels true.

There’s something in the moment that feels tenuous to Adam, like he’s standing on the sharp edge of a knife deciding which way to cut himself. He could get out of the car and get his bike and walk down the road, leaving everything as it stands. Knowing more about Declan and giving Declan nothing. It would be the better option, he knows. It would be the smarter option. It would be the option that doesn’t prompt questions, that lets him continue to be unknown. Invulnerable and unexposed and utterly alone.

He chooses the other option.

“Family doesn’t mean shit for a Parrish,” Adam says, letting his voice fall into its natural Henrietta twang. “Family means a double-wide trailer in pretty good shape, and booze for my dad and, sometimes, drugs for my mom when they both think I don’t notice. And three jobs for me to pay for tuition and food. Family means being trapped. And I’m not gonna be trapped here getting ground down to nothing.”

“Is your dad the one that hits you?” 

Adam could answer. He could say yes, could explain that sometimes the hitting isn’t even the worst of it. That it’s never knowing when the hit is going to come, having to tiptoe around his life to keep his dad from lashing out. That it’s being told time and time again that it’s what he deserves and knowing that if he doesn’t get out of here sooner rather than later, he will start believing it. That it’s lying in his bed at night, his stomach growling and his head aching and his ribs sore and his brain unable to stop replaying the words his dad said when he found out Adam spent good money on notebooks instead of coughing it over, when he knows the next night after work, Robert Parrish is going to blow $40 at the liquor store and drink the money down the drain.

Regular Robert Parrish rants about how Adam is too soft, with his caring about school instead of dropping out to work like a real man, often turn into rants laced with casual slurs that land harder than Adam wishes they did. He could tell Declan that the worst part of all is his dad sometimes being right. It makes him question whether he’s right about everything else, too.

“Is your dad the one that hits _you_?” he asks, instead.

“No,” Declan says easily. “He doesn’t hit me unless we’re boxing. That wasn’t how I got the bruise that day, but it was not exactly a lie. He did teach all of us to box.”

“Well. Mine taught me how to take a hit. And would’ve done worse if he heard that I was doing what you were doing in the library today.”

“I did intend to discuss that with you,” Declan says, and the intensity of the moment slips away, Declan’s mask of formality put back on. A car turns into the driveway, the headlights shining through the windows of the Volvo, and another car passes by them on the road. Adam makes no move to get out of the car. “I would appreciate your discretion on that. I’m not exactly in the closet at school, but I am in a relationship, and the other student-”

“I meant what I said when I said I wasn’t going to tell anyone,” Adam reassures him. “Though, really. If you don’t want it to get back to your girlfriend in the future, try not doing it in the first place. Or not having a girlfriend. You’re lucky it was me who saw it. A fellow bi with no friends.”

The word sounds weird in his voice. He doesn’t think he has (he knows, he knows deep in his bones that he hasn’t) ever said it out loud before, but it’s a night for being brave, apparently. A night for exorcising secrets. 

The look Declan gives him, warm and heavy, brings to the front of Adam’s mind the way he looked in the library. A shiver runs down his spine.

“Then I won’t share your secrets, either, Adam Parrish.” Declan’s voice curls around his name in a way Adam was sure it didn’t ten minutes ago. Adam hates that he knows that, hates that he knows now in a visceral way that things have shifted, and that he doesn’t understand what that means.

In this, like in everything else in Adam’s life, there is no going back now, though.

He just wishes that he knew the rules for going forward. He wishes going forward felt less like playing with fire.

_____

Only two weeks later, Adam’s life looks very different, on the surface.

It turns out that Declan was not kidding about Gansey chatting his ear off. Adam goes to school, and Gansey starts finding him in the hallway or before class or during lunch, making excuses to talk to him about homework assignments and cars and, of all things, Welsh kings. Gansey is much less cool, much more excitable, up close than he is from afar. It grows on Adam quickly, the way Gansey falls so easily into unbridled enthusiasm. It even bleeds over to Ronan, sometimes, when Gansey gets going, Ronan’s grin softening into something warm and fond and significantly less wild.

Ronan stares at Adam across the lunch table with only a moderate amount of suspicion and a large amount of intensity. Ronan laughs sometimes when Adam makes jokes, a loud, abrupt sound that settles soft in Adam’s gut. Adam thinks that, as far as Ronan Lynch is concerned, that probably counts as approval.

Adam has to admit that he likes it. It’s been a long time since Adam has felt like he had friends. He wasn’t sure, at first, if he could call it that. But Gansey announces it into existence one day, and suddenly Ronan is passing him neatly written notes with terrible grammar in Latin class, and Gansey is telling Adam he should come back to his refurbished factory sometime, and people are talking about him differently, as if he were one of Gansey’s.

He tries to stop Declan’s words from running through his head, tries not to think of it as being collected. He doesn’t think it can count as being collected if there are only two of them that Gansey actively works to keep around. At least, that is what he tells himself when he faces down the daily decision of whether he wants to sit at the cafeteria table alone and keep his pride or whether he wants to feel warm and wanted but have people shoot him looks when Gansey gives him fist bumps and calls him tiger.

Sitting with Gansey and Ronan always wins. At the end of the day, it’s no real contest.

Declan is around more, now, too. Adam isn’t sure if it is a byproduct of hanging around one of his brothers, or whether Adam passed some sort of weird, repressed Lynch initiation test. Declan often offers him rides (which he turns down) and unsolicited advice (which he sometimes turns down) and smug once-overs that make Adam itch to do something (which he tells himself he doesn’t understand, except that that’s a lie, and he does, and he thinks Declan does, too).

Under the surface, though, not much has changed. Adam isn’t any less bone dead tired, any less stretched thin. His jobs and his school don’t get easier or less demanding. Gansey spends lunch plotting a weekend afternoon trip to run around with a piece of junk he found online, supposedly searching for ley lines, and Adam realizes that the tiredness is about to get worse. He didn’t factor into having friends that friends would require he give things up, too, time and energy he doesn’t have much of even for himself. Money, when they try to get him to go to Nino’s with them. Gansey trips over himself to try to pay for Adam, and it only makes it more exhausting, realizing that Gansey will always be trying to help and that it will always be rubbing Adam the wrong way.

Even worse, he knows he’s living on borrowed time with his dad, that he’s only made it this long without a rough night because the last set of bruises was too visible. He’s counting down the days until the next outburst, counting down the hours until he has to hide or explain away new bruises to his new friends. He doesn’t believe for a second that Gansey will not overreact, asking a million questions and trying to figure out what it is he can _do_ about it.

Adam doesn’t think Gansey will like “nothing” as an answer.

And then, there’s the quietest and most uncomfortable thought of all, the one that lingers in the back of Adam’s head whenever he starts creeping suspiciously close to happy. The one that is always there when he starts the dark bike ride back to his trailer, the bubble of warmth he formed around himself starting to melt away.

 _This will make it harder to leave_ , his brain says. _If you let yourself put down roots, you won’t be able to leave, and all of this will have been for nothing_.

It always brings him back down to earth. It always reminds him what he’s doing here. Reminds him that he isn’t at Aglionby to form brotherly (or not so brotherly) bonds, to surround himself with fellow scholars, or whatever it is that Gansey talks wistfully about when he talks about his dad’s time at his old fancy high school. Aglionby is a way out, and no matter what happens, he can’t let himself get distracted from that.

The next day at lunch, when he watches Ronan steal Gansey’s fries and Gansey fussing over Ronan’s hair getting too wild, he decides that maybe needing to get out doesn’t mean being so small he’s barely there. That maybe it is okay to be seen. To be known, even if it’s just a little bit.

Having friends feels good, and he’ll take all the small mercies he can get.

_____

“Adam, you should come, too.”

Coming from anyone but Gansey, it would be a simple thing, a casual throw-away offer. Easy to respond with “ _thanks, but no thanks_ ” or “ _I’m busy that night_ ” and go along with his day.

“I promise it isn’t as terrible as it sounds,” Gansey says, pressing on. “I know you are not the fondest of anything tangential to rowing, but it is a worthwhile social event. Declan’s going. Matthew’s going. Even Ronan’s going.”

Adam looks to Ronan, who shrugs. “It’s not. Worthwhile. It’s a terrible mess of a party, but he drags me there every year. It’s free booze, at least, and Gansey always manages to get bored before the cops get called. It’s a night full of watching drunk assholes be assholes to each other and suck up to Gansey.”

“This… doesn’t sound like my kind of thing,” Adam says. It sounds like a nightmare, actually, drunk, rich high schoolers getting loud and rowdy. Claustrophobia and nausea flare up just thinking about it.

“You don’t have to stay long,” Gansey says, as if he’s being charitable. Compromising. “It’s good to make an appearance, though. Aglionby can provide useful connections in the future, you know. You never know when it will pay off, going to these sorts of things.”

Adam has not known Gansey long, but he already hates the Gansey-ness of Gansey, sometimes, the way he is easily persuasive without having to try, the way he gets to the essence of Adam, as if he saw him all along. Adam knew from the start that he would end up saying yes, and now Gansey’s given him the logical excuse to try to soothe the overwhelming sense that this is going to go terribly wrong.

“Declan can give you a ride if you’re going to fuck off early,” Ronan says. “Declan never stays at these things very long. He can pick you up after work.”

Gansey looks at Adam expectantly, and Adam sighs, but caves. “Fine. Declan can come pick me up from home, though, not from work. I have to drop stuff off in my room and change out of my work clothes.”

“Excellent,” Gansey says, beaming at Adam. “Now, onto that new lead you found last night on Glendower.”

_____

In hindsight, Adam should have known something was about to go wrong the second he walked into the trailer.

Any other night, he would have. He would have read all the signs, the way his mother hovered around the kitchen, grabbing his dad a new beer or fussing with the kitchen towels, as if she could evade notice by never staying in one place for long. His dad, on the other hand, was eerily still in his easy chair, a beer in his hand and an empty in the trash, the silence echoing throughout the living room.

Adam is in a hurry to get to his room. Declan is showing up in ten minutes. Adam does not want to keep him waiting. Adam forgets himself, forgets who he is and where he is.

“You’re in an awful rush tonight, now, aren’t you?” his dad asks. 

It’s the kind of question that puts ice in Adam’s veins, that stops him dead. It’s the kind of question that he knows better than to answer, the kind of question his dad sinks his teeth into. His dad already knows the answer. 

“I was having a friendly chat with one of the neighbors,” his dad continues. “She told me she saw the strangest thing. Said she saw a boy that looked just like my boy sitting in the front seat of a fancy silver car, loitering outside the trailer park with some no good raven boy. And I said to myself, my boy knows better than to think that those boys give two shits about him. But then I heard you were in town spending grocery money on pizza with that politician’s son, and I thought to myself, y’know. Maybe that fancy school’s giving Adam some crazy ideas, after all. You think you’re better than us, son?”

Adam feels himself getting smaller by the second, his shoulders curling inward and his face angling down towards the floor. He immediately gives the correct answer, “no, sir,” but he can tell from the fire in his father’s eyes that no amount of right answers are going to get him out of this tonight until his father is good and done with him. His dad is raring for a fight, eager to have something to complain about, and Adam always was his favorite target.

When his dad raises up to his full height, when he looms over Adam, when he raises his hand up to Adam’s face, his voice even and his eyes clear, Adam knows he isn’t getting out of this unscathed.

Adam says what he’s supposed to when prompted, though every choked out word costs him. It’s worse, when it comes from his own mouth instead of theirs. If the words sit there too long, he knows they’ll find a home. 

After, his dad sits back in the easy chair and Adam goes outside. He sits on the step, one giant ache. His nose is bleeding, but he doesn’t think it’s broken, because Robert Parrish was sober enough to pull punches, to make sure Adam knew he could hurt him worse if he really wanted. 

It’s always worse when he’s sober.

Adam slows the bleeding and takes stock of himself. He’s too numb to feel the chill in the air, too hopeless to look up at how clear the night sky is. He can’t bear to feel hurt, so he always defaults into feeling nothing at all, leaving the processing until he starts to feel more human.

Until recently, that meant he didn’t process it. He rarely started to feel more human.

He forgets about Declan until he hears a faint honk coming from down the driveway. He knows he should just ignore it. He knows, without knowing the time, that if he were Declan, he would’ve gotten sick of waiting and left already. He knows he should do nothing and apologize to Declan later, say he got caught up with something at work and pretend everything is okay. Declan probably wouldn’t buy it, but Declan, of anyone, would understand the best.

Instead, Adam wanders down the driveway, conscious but uncaring of the way his hands and shirt are smeared with oil and blood

“Jesus,” Declan says when he sees him.

“I’m not going to make it to the party,” Adam says flatly, aiming for wry, and Declan, to his credit, starts to laugh.

_____

The night turns like this.

“You should let me clean you up. I’ve seen worse. I’ve had worse. I know how to deal with this.”

“You should just get in the car. I know you’re stubborn, I know you don’t want help, but I want to help you. I don’t want you to be alone with them right now.”

“I want to take you to the Barns. I want to take you there and clean you up. No one will be home, my parents do date night on Fridays when my dad’s in town. Did he hit you anywhere other than your face?”

“Adam, just get in the car. Don’t make me beg you to let me take care of you. I won’t do it, and we both want it, anyway. I can take care of you.”

Adam thinks absently that things must look bad if Declan is being this openly concerned about him. He gets in the car. His dad’s words ring in his head, and he knows this is a stupid decision, especially so late, but he does it anyway. Adam sits down and lets future Declan deal with whether his seats will need to be cleaned. Adam lets Declan drive him away from the trailer park and to the highway, lets him drive him out of Henrietta and turn off at an exit Adam doesn’t know. Adam lets Declan drive them out away from the main road, lets him navigate expertly through roads that seem to Adam to turn on a hairpin, shrouded in mist and covered in darkness from the trees blotting out the sky, until they arrive, and the farmhouse looms, illuminated by Declan’s headlights and by light streaming out of one window of the house.

“This is us,” Declan says, pulling up onto a gravel driveway and parking. Adam follows him out of the car. In front of them is an expanse of green, the hills rolling on forever, dotted by white-topped barns that are barely visible in the darkness.

The air feels different here, Adam thinks, in a way that drags him back to reality, back to his body. He can’t trudge forward in a fog when the wind keeps rustling through the oak trees, tugging at him, forcing him to pay attention. He feels silly for thinking it, but he can’t explain it any other way. 

He wishes the fog in the head would stay around longer. Right after is when he needs it the most.

“This place feels…” Adam trails off, uncertain that there is a word for the feeling he has staring at the home in front of him, rustic and worn and warm in a way that twists in his gut. The air around him smells like earth. There’s something about the Barns that feels like a fairytale, the best piece of every version of every story. “Magical.”

Declan sends Adam a sharp, curious look that is hard for Adam to miss. Adam remembers himself, scowls. “If you tell me I’m starting to sound like Gansey…” he starts to warn, but Declan shakes his head, cuts him off.

“No, it’s...not that. Don’t worry about it. I’m just not used to people seeing it for the first time anymore.”

 _Lynches don’t take well to outsiders_ echoes in Adam’s head. 

Declan unlocks the door and warns Adam not to touch anything. Adam snorts, expecting that this will mean a house full of expensive shit that is too fragile to sneeze near. The idea is totally at odds with the outside of the house, and when Declan unlocks the door for Adam, the instruction makes even less sense. He wishes he had the time to take it all in. The scent is familiar, something he’s caught off Ronan. He could never place exactly what it was then and he can’t now, except for the unmistakable smell of lemon scented cleaner. Everything is warm and worn and mismatched, functional, with stuff crowded into every space where stuff can live.

Declan rushes Adam through the room and to a bedroom. To his bedroom, his bed covered in a warm blue quilt, the walls a soft grey. Compared to the kitchen and the living room, this room seems almost sparse, like the personality has been tucked away in corners, where no one can see it.

“Sit on the bed. I’ll be right back,” Declan says, and then he is gone.

Adam sits on the bed. He hurts. Adam hates this part, the part where the pain starts to truly sink in, when it’s fresh, before he can start to push it away. The seconds draw on too long. 

Declan comes back with a well-stocked first aid kit, a dark, dripping washcloth and a half-full bottle of expensive-looking whiskey with two plastic cups stacked precariously over the top. He sets everything down, though Adam doesn’t know what he plans to do with the first aid kit. He thinks the washcloth should be enough.

“Do you want something to drink first?” Declan asks. “I don’t know about you, but I would like a fucking drink.”

A million thoughts run through Adam’s head. His dad, drunk and angry, is the loudest. He knows the right answer, the responsible answer, should be no, no thank you. After the night he had, especially, he thinks Declan is maybe expecting him to say no, from the way Declan’s hand hovers over the top of the bottle. Like if Adam says no, the whole thing goes away.

“He wasn’t drunk,” Adam corrects him, because he’s suddenly realizing how this must look. “This time. And this isn’t the shit he drinks. This is the shit people richer than us blow their money on.”

“Is that a yes?” Declan asks, more patient than Adam thinks he should be. 

The surprising part is that it is a yes. He couldn’t explain it out loud to Declan without feeling silly. He will probably feel silly about it himself three hours from now when the shame and self-judgment hit. He imagines that, to Declan, the decision will look like him wanting a break from his head, or a break from the pain. The thought does occur to him, though he doesn’t like it, doesn’t entertain it for a second. That turns the booze into something that could help, something he could start to need. He refuses to let himself go down that road. Some part of him does feel an urge to try to understand, though. To try to wrap his head around what could be so good about it. 

Adam nods, and Declan pours some for them both. The bottle goes onto the floor. Declan sits close to Adam on the bed, their arms brushing, a line of warmth against Adam’s skin. Declan knocks his plastic cup against Adam’s and takes a swig.

Adam takes a much smaller sip. It tastes like battery acid, or lighter fluid, a mouthful of burning. He knows that some people have a taste for this, are pretentious about the flavors of it, drop words like smooth and smoky, but he can’t taste any of that. He takes another, smaller sip, this time, to test if his taste buds have adjusted.

They have not. A third sip isn’t any better.

They sit in relative silence with their drinks. Adam stares down at the cup in his hand, debates if he wants to try to chug it all down, to see what is on the other side of it lighting up his insides. He tries to decide if he wants to actually continue with this, if he actually _wants_ to understand.

He sets the cup down on Declan’s nightstand. He decides he does not want to know if there is another Adam on the other side of this. He knows there isn’t for his dad—Robert is Robert, drunk or sober. Adam thinks it makes it worse, sometimes, that it isn’t the booze that makes him that way. But he decides he’s good with not figuring this out tonight, after all. That he may be good with never figuring it out. Some things are better left untouched.

Declan seems to sense that the mood is shifting, or else just decides he’s done, too, because he puts down his drink as well. It looks nearly empty, anyway. 

“Okay,” Declan says as he picks up the washcloth. “Hold still, I’m going to get some of this blood off your face.” 

Adam wants to tell him that he can do this part himself. That he _has_ done this part himself, dozens of times, because he didn’t have a choice. There were no soothing words from his mother, no patching up his cuts and scrapes. The words die in his throat, though, because Declan leans in so close that Adam can smell the whiskey on his breath. The brush of the washcloth is warm and unbearably gentle against Adam’s skin. Declan’s eyes are on Adam’s face as he carefully wipes blood from Adam’s chin, from his cheek, from above Adam’s upper lip. Adam winces as Declan brushes a tender spot on his nose, but there are shivers down his spine, suddenly aware of how close Declan is to him, how intimate this is.

Declan could be rough, or clinical. He gives Adam softness, instead.

Declan sets the washcloth down, but his attention is still on Adam’s face, narrowed in on Adam’s mouth. His knee knocks against Adam’s, and his eyes are so incredibly blue that Adam feels it swirling in his stomach with the whiskey. 

Adam moves, without thinking about it. When he kisses Declan, when Declan kisses him back, there is nothing tentative in it, no caution signs or hesitation. But for all the fire he’s had in his veins about it for the past few weeks, this is something entirely different. The kiss is eager, but not wild. It’s decisive, but not desperate. Declan kisses him back, slowing it even further to something warm and steady, cupping Adam’s cheek with his hand with all the tenderness of the wet cloth against Adam’s face. 

Adam thinks there will be another time for this, another time to do it differently, to let Declan kiss him down into the bed, smile sharp, sucking those marks into Adam’s neck that he saw on the boy in the library. Adam thinks there will be another time for his hands to pull Declan’s shirt over his head, for letting Declan slide his underwear off. Adam wants that, wants the wildness and the hunger, wants to feel lost in the moment. Wants to feel caught up in the wanting he’s denied himself for so long. It would be a fun kind of distraction, he thinks. For both of them. He ignores the reminder in the back of his head that Declan has a girlfriend.

That is Declan’s problem to deal with, not his.

Right now, every bit of Adam feels raw, flayed open. Declan had said he could take care of Adam, and Adam thinks that maybe Declan thinks that this is part of that, too. Tending to wounds, giving Adam space to make decisions, making everything slow and achingly soft, kindness that Adam wouldn’t have shown to his own body at the end of the night.

Adam wonders if anyone has ever shown Declan that kind of gentleness. If Declan is giving it to Adam because he hasn’t ever fully received it himself.

They sit together for a while, after. Adam thinks it was a more revealing night for both of them than either of them would have liked, and neither of them is looking to spill more blood or secrets. Adam doesn’t ask about the Barns, doesn’t ask who looks after Declan when he comes home with bruises. Declan doesn’t ask Adam to tell him what happened, doesn’t get angry at Adam’s dad, or at Adam for not being able to get up and go. Adam asks Declan not to say anything about it to Ronan or Gansey.

“You should probably stay the night,” Declan says, almost apologetic. Like he might know the kind of trouble he is causing by saying it. Like he might know that not going home at all, staying the night with him, might make things worse. “It’s kind of late to be driving back.”

Adam knows he is right. On another night, he might fight Declan on it, might demand that he let Adam go back. Adam isn’t up for making demands, though, and he knows Declan isn’t wrong that the safest place for him right now is at the Barns, even if it does mean Ronan will likely see the damage sooner rather than later.

“Can I borrow your phone to call my mom?” Adam asks, and Declan hands it over without a word.

Adam goes to Declan’s bathroom to make the call, closes the door so he has some privacy. He reminds his mom that he told her he had a school thing. He had told them both. He was planning to be out late tonight, anyway. He tells her he is staying over with a friend and that he will find his way home tomorrow morning. That he will be on time for work.

She is largely silent on the other end. Adam knows that isn’t a good sign, but his capacity to worry is gone for the night. He can feel the part of the night coming where all the emotions have drained out, where he stares at the ceiling until his brain finally shuts off.

When Adam comes back, Declan shoots off a few texts and confirms that his parents are fine with Adam staying. Declan says that Ronan is staying with Gansey at Monmouth for the night. Adam cannot express what a relief it is, so he doesn’t. He thinks Declan knows, anyway.

Adam expects Declan to kick him out of his room, or to pull up a sleeping bag for him, but Declan doesn’t. Declan asks him what time he has to be home in the morning and sets an alarm. Declan offers Adam something to sleep in that isn’t covered in blood. Declan gives Adam a toothbrush to use and makes space in his bed for Adam to curl in.

“If it makes you feel better,” Declan says, his voice hushed in the darkness. “I still don’t know what you are, Adam Parrish.”

“And I don’t know what you are,” Adam replies. He isn’t bothered by it like Declan seems to be. “Maybe that’s something we figure out together.”

Adam wishes it were one of those movie things where having someone else in the bed is such a comfort that his body relaxes and dozes off immediately, but it isn’t. Neither of them falls asleep for a while. Declan has insomnia, too, Adam learns, and it feels like just another piece of a bigger puzzle. He doesn’t think he and Declan are the same, the more he learns about him. He thinks that they are echoes of each other, though, opposite sides of the same coin. He doesn’t know what that means for whatever this thing is, except that he doesn’t think either of them is looking for something gooey and romantic. Adam doesn’t think he is the person to give that to anyone. Adam would rather have something physical, something that is clean and neat and comes with an end date. From what he knows about Declan, it seems like that is what he usually goes for, too. Adam doesn’t consider the idea that this might be different.

Adam is less small than he used to be, but he still would rather have something that doesn’t demand answers he isn’t willing to give. He is not going to put up with Declan lying to him, but he won’t demand answers from him, either. It feels like something that can work, for as long as they want it to.

_____

Eventually, Adam drifts to sleep. The alarm comes too early, but Declan dutifully gets himself out of bed, putting clothes on and offering Adam food and coffee for the road. Adam says yes, because it’s one less thing he has to take care of at home.

The cows are up when they head out to the car. Declan doesn’t seem to notice, and it strikes Adam that this is an everyday part of polished, political Declan’s life. He wonders a lot about the dissonance, but tables it for later. It’s too early in the morning for those kinds of thoughts.

“I’m giving you my cell phone number,” Declan tells him seriously as they pull up to the row of mailboxes outside the trailer park. “If you ever need someone to clean you up again, you can call me.”

Adam takes it, though he thinks they both know he won’t use it unless things get really bad. He gets out of the car, and Declan drives off. Adam leaves a note to his parents on the fridge so they know he came home and bikes to work at the factory.

Adam expects that things will feel different, but they don’t. He works one job and then bikes to the next job, works and bikes home. His dad is angry, but more subdued than the night before. He does homework until he has to sleep. He does it all over again the next day, and then he goes to school on Monday. Gansey checks to see if Adam is feeling okay, but it seems like Declan told them he came down with a bug. Ronan watches Adam’s nose a bit too closely, but he doesn’t poke at it. Adam is grateful.

“We’re just glad you’re okay,” Gansey says. Objectively, Adam knows it’s a polite thing to say, but he also knows that it is genuine, coming from Gansey. It feels different in a way that is good, having people care enough to be concerned for him. Having people who want to take care of him. 

He will always be watching that carefully, deciding what kindness to accept. Deciding where the line is between being cared for and being controlled. He does not think it is a nuance that is clear to Gansey yet. He isn’t sure he could spell it out himself, if asked.

Declan swings by his locker and offers him a ride to Boyd’s at the end of the day. Adam tells him no, but Declan offers it again, and Adam finds himself stuffing his bike into Declan’s trunk after the bell rings.

It’s a weird adjustment, he thinks, letting himself grow into a more whole human being. Expanding the size of himself. 

He thinks it will be a good one.

**Author's Note:**

> On tumblr at [sleepy-skittles](https://sleepy-skittles.tumblr.com/).


End file.
